8/27/2011 Bear Country USA

Bear Country. This is another place that was on our to do list since so many people would come back to the FamCamp and tell us they went there and enjoyed it so much. Actually, it was on the list, then it would be off, back on, off, back on….and then we decided we would be sorry if we left this area and didn’t go.

So today is the day. We had to pick one of the hottest to ride through a wild life area with the windows UP! Well, we were supposed to ride through with windows up. Firstly, it was too hot to have them up and secondly, our windows are tinted, we couldn’t take pictures through tinted windows! It was so hot the animals were just laying around anyway for the most part.

Our view as we stopped to pay our entrance fee.

We drove into the gated compound and the first animal we saw were elk. Most of them were laying down under the trees for shade from the hot sun but this one evidently hadn’t found his happy place yet on the ground.

This poor reindeer just looked so hot and drug out.

Artic Wolves

Goats and Rams

Big Cats!

We finally made it to the area that this whole place is named for……

BEAR COUNTRY!

This one walked right next to the truck.

The latest in bear “do’s” ??????

I think we were surprised at how many bears we would see.

Buffalo were next, babies and adults.

To think that the baby above is going to grow into this!

The Pronghorn’s looked so tiny next to these big boys.

We were done with the driving part of Bear Country USA and we saw a lot more animals than what I showed here.

Next came bear baby land.

Of course this isn’t a baby but instead a full grown grizzly bear just trying to keep cool in this heat.

Grizzly bears with live 30 – 40 years in captivity versus 10 – 20 in the wild. When I read this on the information board it brought back the trip to Denali in Alaska where we got to see some in their natural habitat. We three were glad we are part of the 1% of the world’s population that gets to see that.

Grey Wolf

We finally got to the section we had heard so much about.

They were so much fun to watch while they played in the water.

However, everyone’s attention was drawn to the little bears who climbed the trees!

Three bears in a tree!

Feeding time! It sure didn’t take long for the cubs to leave the pool, wake up from naps and climb down from high tree branches when their caretakers showed up.

That isn’t real bear in the picture below.

We made our way into the gift shop which was just HUGE!

Can you make out what this is?

We sure are glad we went to Bear Country USA.